


Uncrossing the Stars

by otterlymagic



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Study, F/M, Happy Ending, Kylo Ren Redemption, Long-Distance Relationship, Minor Finn/Rose Tico, Not Canon Compliant - Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Post-Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Rey Gets Food, Slow Romance, Virgin Kylo Ren, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-15
Updated: 2020-03-15
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:40:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,823
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22789621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/otterlymagic/pseuds/otterlymagic
Summary: TRoS ending rewrite. Follows Rey as she makes a place for herself in a peaceful galaxy while Ben works on his redemption. Their happily ever after is slightly delayed, but the forcebond is still active and true happiness is a work in progress.Character study and slow build relationship, with some fluff and smut and intergalactic politics thrown in. Certain things in TRoS just...didn't happen.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 3
Kudos: 37
Collections: Reylo Charity Anthology: Volume 2





	Uncrossing the Stars

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to ElegyGoldsmith for the beta read!
> 
> Content you might want to be aware of: Pregnancy mention with a side character. Food and alcohol consumption. Smut scene involves no penetration.

After Palpatine’s end, the galaxy produces celebrations by the thousands. Rey stays on Ajan Kloss for theirs, eating her fill and then some of a dozen different cuisines–all of them new, all of them delicious. Despite the lives lost, all around her are drinks, fireworks, kisses, laughter, music, and food. 

Finn and Poe–apparently he likes her now–and Rose and half a dozen others hug her. They don’t ask first but she doesn’t mind. A part of her does mind that they don’t ask questions about everything from the moment she left in Kylo’s ship, to the moment she returned in Luke’s. She just doesn’t mind enough to offer up her tale unprompted.

As a group of dancers spin by her, laughing, a woman hands her a ceramic mug of some warm, spiced liqueur. She grins and the dancers spin away, leaving Rey on the edge of the jungle, alone and unwatched. The liqueur goes down smoothly, but she sips rather than downs it all at once, holding it to her chest between drinks. The party is raucous and loud in ways she doesn’t understand, but she lets out a long breath as the tension leaves her limbs. Some of it is tension that feels like it has been with her since her earliest memories. 

A breeze flutters through the hush of jungle verdure behind her, and she can feel the Force. Unexpectedly, however, it draws into an even deeper hush. She looks up, a smile on her face before she knows why.

“You look flushed,” Ben says. He’s leaning against something, though not the tree that stands just behind where she can see him. The shadows on his face are tinged blue with moonlight in contrast to the reflected fireglow on her own face. He’s with her and yet not.

“I’ve never had this much to drink before,” she replies, holding out her mug in a way that sloshes the liquid inside. The warmth in her belly drops a little lower, and the pull of the forcebond between them is softly insistent. “You look relaxed.”

He shrugs. “It’ll probably be on the holonews tomorrow, but I just took out the enforcer droids at Hux’s training academy for Stormtroopers. They’re free now. They’re all too young to know where to go next, but I’ve alerted the nearest New Republic public services organization. I trust that they’ll be in good hands soon enough.”

There’s an unspoken tension in the fact that once Ben supported that academy as Kylo Ren. This is not an act of charity, at its core, but rather penance for a wrong he had a hand in. Still, Rey chooses to celebrate the act on its own merit, for the thought of hundreds of children freed in a single day. “What next?” she asks.

He looks pensive, dropping his eyes to his hands before lifting them up again to meet hers. “My mother.”

Rey should be glad that he has all the right priorities, but a tiny voice inside wishes his next step would be to join her.

Ben’s lip twitches as if he can read her thoughts. “You know I can’t risk more than that,” he says. “But I’m glad we have this.”

Sometimes she forgets that though she initiated, he was the one who kissed her back. This tug between them is not one-sided. Rey has his name on the tip of her tongue, but the Force connection ends then, and she whispers “Ben” to the solitude around her instead.

Part of her longs to be desperate, greedy, and impatient, to take claim of what is rightfully hers. The Force whispers in her mind to wait a little longer. Her reward will come slowly, it says, and yet it will last for a long time so she does not need to fear the future.

Trusting the Force is new for Rey. She does her best–but she holds the impatient option in reserve. She’s waited a very long time to be happy. There’s only so much more waiting she is willing to do.

Yet time flies by, her life is full, and hope is a resilient thing when founded upon something real.

“How are you doing?” Leia asks, when the ceremony to disband the Resistance is over.

Rey shrugs. “I’m still surprised the New Republic hasn’t tried to take me into custody,” she says to Leia. 

People have been having a hard time looking her in the eyes ever since the report came out of the New Republic’s headquarters about her actions among the enemy. Several First Order defectors–former General Hux among them–have pleaded for amnesty and spilled information in payment. One particularly juicy piece being a less-than-confrontational elevator conversation between Rey of Jakku and the soon-to-be Supreme Leader Kylo Ren.

Leia looks vaguely amused. “They never brought my brother in either after his claims about Vader,” she says. “You know that story, right?”

Rey nods. She knows the basic beats, in any case.

“Being a Jedi, or at least  _ seeming _ like a Jedi, has its privileges.” Leia pats Rey’s hand. “They won’t come for you. They’ll just wait for you to lead them to someone more vulnerable.”

While said lightly, there is a weight to Leia’s words that both women feel. Some secrets must remain so as the dust settles–as reparations are made and crimes are settled. Everyone in the galaxy has the freedom to stand and speak now, and so there is no end to the voices being heard. Even “heroes” like Rey and Leia have very little special influence over the post–victory narrative.

“You know,” Leia says under her breath, “they asked me if I had any idea of his whereabouts.” She snorts. “If they wanted me to support their vicious system of justice, maybe they shouldn’t have disempowered me from the system in the first place. They banished me for being Vader’s daughter, you know. I hadn’t committed a crime other than being born, but no, blood ties were all that they could see. And yet they expect me to betray my own blood now.”

Rey doesn’t know much about politics and doesn’t care to, but she knows it was easier to make decisions when it was just Light versus Dark and Resistance versus First Order. Now everything is messier and busier, and while everyone’s intentions seem pure, their actions are not without the occasional collateral damage. Justice doesn’t come easily, and there are millions who need it. The entire galaxy is calling for Kylo Ren’s head on a spike, right now, without no thought but revenge.

Rey cannot fight the entire galaxy. In the end she is just one woman, and there is no countdown, no deadline. Just life, full of possibilities. She can wait for the tide of public opinion to ebb and flow in a more…flexible direction.

This is why Leia is going with Chewie in her own ship, and not Rey. Ben needs to see his mother and begin to reconcile, but his location cannot be compromised yet. All eyes are on Rey, after the reports–every twitch of her fingertip is analyzed for clues–so she must be careful. 

It’s lonely, even if it won’t last forever. Rey soon learns the difference between mere companionship and true friendship, and it’s a good lesson. She tries to deepen her relationship with Finn and Rose and more, but they keep looking at her as if they can’t see past the surface and so she finds herself clamming up. There’s parts of her that, she still fears, they can neither comprehend nor truly accept, so they don’t even try. Her heart tells her that she cannot stay on Ajan Kloss much longer.

When she looks at the stars, she sees a million worlds full of lost souls struggling to find their place. Like her, and like Ben. Her fate is not to settle down with her friends, though she loves them dearly, but perhaps it is out there, reminding people that they’re neither alone nor invisible.

Leia gives Rey a hug goodbye before she takes Chewie and a ship and goes to…wherever Ben is. (For his safety, Rey doesn’t know for sure.) Rey doesn’t fret. She will never be alone again. There’s a difference between lonely and alone, and she’s clinging tightly to it.

\---

Before Rey has a chance to leave the former Resistance base, she opens her eyes one morning and there is no base left at all. People who have homes and families return to them. Everyone else goes with trusted companions, or finds a purpose. 

Rose is one of the latter. When she asks for Rey’s help with a mission, Rey finds that it’s nice to be pointed in a direction and told “go”. She doesn’t think to ask questions beyond the bare bones facts that Rose provides, and Chewie is just happy for the company and a use for the Falcon, so Rey is surprised when they end up landing at Canto Bight. 

She’s even more surprised that the place is in shambles, so much so that it’s visible as soon as they drop the Falcon’s ramp–the city is as chaotic as Niima Outpost, but nothing like the luxury resort that Rey had heard about. It’s a new sight nonetheless. Rey stands at the door, one hand on a support, and Rose rushes out before she has a chance to finally ask a question.

Rose’s face is all frowns as she hurries past Rey, but then it brightens, and Rey sees half a dozen children sprint across the landing platform towards Rose. “It’s the Resistance leader!” one of them cries out triumphantly, and the others cheer.

Behind her, Chewie tells the Falcon’s porg population that on this mission, they had better stay inside unless they want to be taken as children’s pets.

Rey walks down to join Rose, curious.

“Can you talk with them?” Rose asks. All the children look up at Rey with wide eyes and dropped jaws. “I’m going to try to make sure they have homes before I arrange to get aid sent here,” Rose says. “I know every day matters when kids are left alone. I figure…you’d know what questions to ask them, while I talk to the adults who might be able to take them in.”

Rey smiles. “Of course.” It’s nice, she thinks, to be asked on a mission for something other than her Jedi abilities. 

The children don’t immediately swarm her like they did Rose, seemingly gripped with a sort of fear and awe that has come with Rey’s newfound galactic fame. But when she squats down to their level and smiles, suddenly the questions start coming and they don’t stop coming. 

Maybe someone, somewhere, would tell Rey that she has better things to do. But there’s something special about the way the children laugh and point when Rey does a lightsaber demonstration. There’s something important when she talks about the Force and they listen, with open eyes and minds. She is hope to them. And though she’s not ready to say it out loud, she’d rather be hope to a few dozen children who have nothing else, and are overjoyed with her just as she is, than be a figurehead to a galaxy that is never satisfied with her efforts.

Rose organizes Canto Bight and documents all the children’s needs, and Rey…is Rey. Later in the day, Chewie comes out of the Falcon with food for them all, and Rey and the children sit around in a circle and share crackers and broth with greens and bits of dried root in it. Rey pulls out her bag of protein bars as well, when she notices that most of the children have too-pointy jaws and elbows and knees. They need them more than her.

When the sun sets, and the children’s excitement turns to yawns, Rose is still negotiating and so Rey calls it a night. “Even I need a good night’s sleep,” Rey says, in what she hopes is an appropriately parental tone, to encourage the reluctant stragglers to get into their beds.

It’s been a good day. She’s not tired, though she’s said more words today than in the last week, and she sits cross-legged on a large flat stone to look up at the stars. Her thoughts stray, as always, to the last she heard from Ben. He was helping with disaster relief as of yesterday, on a world where the First Order had mined too deeply. No one asks questions when a big man offers to help with heavy labor, apparently, even if he looks vaguely like one of the wanted posters in their local tavern. She wonders now if children ever swarm around him and ask about his saber.

“Master Rey?” comes a tiny voice behind her.

The title catches her off guard. She turns to see a boy, about half her height, standing a few feet from her and clutching a broomstick in his hand.

“What’s wrong?” she asks. 

The boy looks nervous. “My name’s Davi,” he says, taking another hesitant step forward. “I… I had a question.” He lets the broomstick go from his hand, and it floats up and rotates until it’s hovering horizontally a few inches below his hands. “Is this the Force?”

Rey blinks. It’s an easy question, of course, yet her mind goes blank.  _ This is not a question children should be asking  _ me _ of all people _ , she thinks.

It’s almost a relief when the Force flickers around her, igniting the bond.

“Are you afraid?” Ben asks, once he’s visible and can clearly see the internal panic displayed on her face.

Rey shakes her head–then realizes what Davi can see, and hurries to say aloud, “Yes, that is the Force. It’s part of it, in any case. Don’t be scared.”

“Oh,” Ben says. Whatever he understands, it’s probably more than Rey does herself.  _ Help me, _ she thinks but cannot say.  _ I’m not a master, no matter what they think. _

Davi lets out a shaky breath and walks forward. With Rey sitting, he can look her straight in the eye. It takes him a moment, though. Rey knows what it’s like to be fearful of authority and tries to smile reassuringly. “If it is the Force,” Davi says, in a small voice, “I’m not afraid of it. But I’m afraid of the Dark Side, and I don’t know how to be a Jedi instead.”

The way he looks at her, she knows he mostly sees someone older and wiser. Rey might have been those, she thinks, had she not learned about all of this only two years ago.

Ben steps out of the periphery of Rey’s vision, his brow furrowed and his gaze piercing. He’s not looking at Rey, but at the boy who cannot see him. Can he hear the boy? See him? He must, or maybe he just sees through Rey’s thoughts. Ben drops down, resting his weight on his heels, taller than the both of them even when crouched down. He smiles a little. “We’re not alone,” he says to her.

Like air released from a pressurized hatch, Rey feels her internal panic settle down. She’s new to this but Ben isn’t–and he’s here, by her side, and she can sense that he trusts her to say the right thing to this boy. Maybe she knows more than she thinks she does.

It’s only a couple seconds in the real world, after Davi finishes speaking, before Rey finds words. “You don’t have to be a Jedi, if you don’t want to,” she says. “It’s not a curse. Not even the Dark Side. It’s something we all share. Light, Dark…everyone feels the Force, some just feel it more than others.”

Davi grasps the floating broomstick, and glances up to the stars before meeting Rey’s eyes again. “But in all the stories…”

“Some of them are just myths,” Rey says and shrugs. “Some of them are true, too, but we don’t have to repeat them.” She can feel Ben’s eyes on her, and Davi’s, and both of them are hushed and hanging onto her words. “Do you know who’s the true master of your story?”

Davi’s eyes widen. “Master Skywalker? But I think he died.”

Ben rolls his eyes and Rey shakes her head. She pokes Davi’s forehead with a fingertip.  _ “You’re _ the master. Just like I was. I know this because lots of people tried to tell me what my story was. They were all wrong. I had to decide it for myself, when I was ready.”

Davi frowns, though he doesn’t discount her words. “How did you know you were ready?”

She looks off to the distance before looking into Ben’s eyes. He doesn’t need to say a word for her to know that there’s a dozen thoughts swirling in his head. Flashes of memory, of a life before they met. One day she wants to hear them all–his own story and how he finally mastered it. 

Right now, though, she tries to imagine him as a boy, long ago. She remembers herself as a girl too, looking up to whoever claimed to know who she was. When they were young, what would have guided them on an easier path? What would have been the balm to their small, wounded spirits?

Davi waits patiently for her to answer, and she could say anything now and he would believe it. So it’s important that she tell him the truth, even if it isn’t some eloquent, ancient wisdom.

“I didn’t  _ know _ I was ready,” she admits at last. “But as you grow up, one day you’ll feel deep down what is right, and you’ll feel that it’s right no matter what anyone tells you. That’s all you need to know, to make your own story. You have to do the next right thing you can do, and keep doing that for the rest of your life.” 

She pauses, swallows, and continues. “Sometimes you’ll find out you’re ready after you’ve done the thing, because you won, even if you didn’t think you could. Sometimes you’ll fail, but that doesn’t mean you weren’t ready. Sometimes we have to be ready for failure, too, because it teaches us something we need to learn. But when that day comes–when you know what’s right–that’s when you start making your story. It doesn’t happen all at once. It’s not magic, it’s hard work.”

“Even with the Force?” Davi asks, a little disappointed.

Rey chuckles. “Even with the Force. But if you listen to it, it’ll help.”

Davi scrunches up his face and lets out a huff of breath. “Thank you, Master Rey. I’ve got a lot to think about. I just know I don’t want the Dark Side to get me. I’d rather be a Jedi, and be good.”

“There’s lots of ways to be good.” Rey reaches out and touches his shoulder. “Thousands of ways. I’m sure you’ll figure out what’s best for you. It might take a while, but you have a long life ahead. You can take your time.”

The boy lifts his chin up and gives her an incandescent grin. “Alright. I’m gonna go to bed now. See you tomorrow, Master Rey. And…and maybe you can come back and visit, when I’m older, if I want to be a Jedi?”

“I’ll do my best.” The words leave her mouth before she can think twice.

Davi salutes and runs off, leaving her in the darkness.

Ben is still there, silent, and even in the shadows she can see the thoughtfulness on his features. It’s hard not to reach out and try to touch him–sometimes she can, sometimes she can’t, she can never tell for sure. The forcebond doesn’t answer to predictable rules. There’s something safe in the distance, though, as if Rey might explode with how  _ too much _ everything is in her life if she has him too.

“I know why Luke ran away now,” she says. “I can’t do this Jedi Master thing. I’m not qualified to give advice.”

“At least you’re not pretending otherwise.” Ben looks at her, and gestures softly with his fingers. “I would have wanted that honesty at Davi’s age.”

Rey drops down to her knees and lays her hands in her lap. She swallows. “I didn’t have anyone giving me advice at that age. I don’t know what would have been the wrong thing to say. I…” She looks up at the sky. “Davi’s not the only one who will have questions, you know. I need to be better than Luke…and I think I’ll need your help for that.”

“Always.” He smiles, and her stomach knots with how  _ perfect _ a smile it is, and she feels robbed of not seeing it her whole life.

“But I’d like to do it together,” she adds.

He chuckles, dry as it is, and gestures to something near him that she can’t see. “Have you heard? Word has spread around that Kylo Ren has become a vigilante. A…benefactor. The New Republic enforcers are on my trail, of course, and they don’t believe it, but not everyone can afford to be cautious. For every place that trusts me, I make sure to repay it tenfold. Maybe one day that’ll be enough.”

Rey can’t help but smile. “One day,” she says, her voice thick.

What he says is not a promise. He’s too honest to make promises he can’t keep, and the future is cloudy and uncertain even if the Force is strong with you, but there’s hope in his words. They’re young. The galaxy has time to change. They have time to change it and write the story the way they want it written.

She thinks about saying aloud the feeling that swells in her heart. It’s on his lips, too–she can see it in the way they tense in preparation. But in the end, she merely holds out a hand. Their fingers touch and tangle together and it is all she feels. 

They are all that exist in the universe for a few breaths, a few heartbeats, and then the Force breaks it off. Rey looks up at the sky and holds her hand to her heart, still warm with the touch of his fingers.

\---

Sometimes, when it’s just the three of them on the Falcon, she and Rose and Chewie talk about family. It’s the closest Rey feels to them, though their stories are all different. Rose had family and lost it, and somehow the fewer words she says, the more Rey feels the pain. Chewie has a living family, he reveals to their surprise, but they love mostly from a distance these days. He says it’s not something to be unhappy about–that he and his wife have different lives they want to lead, and they give each other space for that. A Wookie’s lifespan is long enough for plenty of love, so there’s no need for constant companionship.

Rey smiles but it’s hard for her to understand being satisfied with compromise. When necessary, she has done the task of it, but every time it’s been partially unwilling. She has always desired more. Yearned for it, dreamed of it, and hoped for it. Patience is a chore for her, even if she doesn’t rage about it.

Maybe it’s just because Chewie is so much older, that he is comfortable with it. Sometimes Rey feels like her life has just begun, years too late, and she must gobble up every happy day ahead of her to make up for the lost time. Maybe one day she’ll be an old woman who is satisfied–who cannot remember what it feels like to be lonely and starving.

She’s happy for Chewie but better understands the look in Rose’s eyes. The look that says  _ “If I had my family back, or if I had a new one to call my own, I’d never willingly let them out of my sight and grasp.” _

At night–or what passes for night in space–she lies on the great double bed in the captain’s quarters and stares at the pillow on the other side. For years, she slept in a small space, wrapped up in a blanket both to keep out the chill and for the sense of security. There had been an ache, deep in her bones, that she told herself was due to hunger or cold or weariness. But the ache had gone away when Finn had embraced her, and every embrace since then had soothed a little more of it. How soothing it might be, she thinks now, to have someone hold her while she sleeps. Right there, their head on that other pillow.

Rey squeezes her eyes shut and drops her spirit into the Force. It’s not the same as a physical presence, but it’s comforting enough for now. She won’t be alone forever. Whatever sort of family her future holds, it’s real. She can feel it, not just see it.

Sleep catches her, as her thoughts drift away, and take her into warm and comforting dreams. Dreams of hope.

That night, however, Rey wakes in the middle of the night to the hush of the Force all around her. There is a heavy weight around her middle, and she is only half awake but she knows immediately what it is. Ben is warmer than any blanket. 

She turns into him, arms tucked against her chest and eyes still closed. When she breathes in she can smell him–sweaty, dusty, with just a hint of soap and linen from whenever he last cleaned. Maybe it’s just a vivid dream. She doesn’t care. It’s a gift regardless.

Her squirming makes his arm settle closer around her waist, and he makes a small mumbly sound somewhere above her head. He’s there but not there. They are stealing yet another moment, while the rest of the galaxy is asleep.

Rey splays a hand over his chest, feeling it rise and fall with his sleepy breathing. She was right. This is better than any waking embrace. Something–that she is hesitant to name, for no word seems to encompass all she feels–seeps all the way down to her soul, and she is  _ happy. _

Even though she knows she’ll wake up to an empty bed, for this bond is ever unsteady and never lingers too long, it feeds her hope to sleep in Ben’s arms. This is the start to a family all her own.

\---

Rey takes the Falcon and travels to dozens of planets with Chewie and Rose over the next months, as she takes on a variety of missions. Sometimes Finn joins them, sometimes Connix, and even Leia occasionally.

Rose leaves after one of the missions with Finn. The porgs who call the Millennium Falcon their home mourn her loss for weeks, eventually deciding that they should nest among Rey’s blankets in the captain’s quarters until Rose returns. The forcebond activates during one of these nesting sessions, and Rey has to explain porgs to a baffled Ben. He blinks. She lifts one of the sleeping young porgs up so he can see it, and he says softly, “It’s cute.” When Rey next sees Rose, she’s all smiles with a rounded belly and Rey has a dozen messages on her holopad from an ecstatic Finn. Then Chewie takes a leave to visit his family on Kashyyyk and BB-8 is Rey’s copilot for a while. 

No matter who’s on the Falcon, it feels like home. Some of that is the ship’s AI and its vivid personality. But Rey’s been fixing it up too, little by little, and she thinks it’s a good way to honor Han’s legacy.

As for the missions themselves, the publicity Rey provides is just as important as their work. Whenever Rey ignites her lightsaber, it makes the galactic news, even if the mission was just transporting medicine. It’s a little ironic, considering that Ben is out there  _ not _ using his lightsaber, and he still makes galactic news. Each article refers to him as Kylo Ren, the rogue war criminal, but it feels like a rote description now.

For all the information that First Order turncoats provided, the New Republic seems to have a much harder time taking out their bases than Ben has. Of course, he has the Force. But he also has determination and a willingness to get his own hands dirty, not contract it out to some public service. He’s efficient in a way that’s needed amongst all the chaos. He’s also freeing up the New Republic to send their own support elsewhere. It’s hard for them to make that fit their established narrative about Kylo Ren, and rumors keep growing in the media about how the story is more complicated.

Despite her loneliness, Rey isn’t angry that Ben focuses primarily on his own redemption. Love  _ feels  _ all-consuming, but it’s not. There’s a balance to be found. They both have to adjust to their new places in the galaxy, her just as much as him.

Of all the planets she visits, Coruscant is the worst. At first it’s the worst because of all the noise and smell and the gleam of metal, when she’d finally gotten used to all the natural variations of other worlds, but then she is called in to see the New Republic’s Senate. Leia squeezes her arm and tells her it’ll be fine, as they enter a floating booth and rise up and out into a vast chamber where a thousand eyes are upon her. But Rey thinks, even before anyone speaks, that it was less torturous to die on Exegol.

“As the last remaining representative of the Jedi Order,” says the newly elected chancellor, speaking for the entire chamber, “we request a statement from you regarding the stratagem you intend on implementing to prevent the rise of another Sith Lord or Dark Side user of the Force.”

Rey stands and, though Leia tried to prepare her, the question is still overwhelming. She has to remind herself to breathe. The whole galaxy is watching her–including children like Davi–and they expect her to speak for the entire Force, it seems.

_ (“I’m so sorry,” Leia had said before they entered the chamber. “I’m entirely familiar with being forced into a role by destiny. At least some of us knew it was coming, because of our families. But I’m here for you, no matter how you handle it.”) _

Rey had planned on saying something about balance, based on what Leia had coached her on. Now, all she can think is that this weight of destiny is too heavy and it will crush her if she lets it. She could work to lessen the weight…but that doesn’t seem like enough.

“You’re asking the wrong question,” she says, and winces when she hears her voice reverberate in the Senate’s speakers. “I’m not a representative of the Jedi Order. There is no Jedi Order anymore.”

Around the room, murmurs sweep through the other senators like a wave, and she feels Leia’s gaze move swiftly from the Senate chamber to the back of her head. 

Rey doesn’t allow for a follow-up question. “And there will  _ be _ no Jedi Order again, if I have anything to say about it,” she says. “It never worked before, and I’m not interested in repeating the mistakes of the past.”

The Force around her pulses, giving her momentum to keep speaking without overthinking the words. “I’m also not going to speak for the Force when it comes to the future. I don’t know how to keep the Sith from coming back. But I think it might help if everyone focused on the Light and Dark within themselves, and their own children, rather than looking to grand masters and lists of rules to make things better. That’s what I’m going to be doing, anyway. Not as Jedi Master Rey, but just Rey.”

A senator’s booth pulls out from the chamber’s wall, speaking before his name is called by the chancellor. “If you’re not taking leadership of the Force users,” he asks in a tight voice, “that means you’re abandoning the galaxy to the likes of Kylo Ren and the Emperor.”

Rage–familiar, sharp, and potent–makes her blood race. She didn’t plan this speech, but she will not be cowed by aristocrats and diplomats. She is  _ tired _ of hearing excuses from people like these. “Kylo Ren wasn’t born, he was made,” Rey snaps. “Maybe the Emperor was too, I don’t know. If the galaxy didn’t treat the Force like some dangerous power that needed to be controlled, maybe you’d understand  _ why  _ they fell instead of just fearing it. Or if you didn’t spend your whole lives focusing on everything except what is in front of you. I’m not going to fix your galaxy for you. I’m not going to balance the Force for you. Look to yourselves for that. The power of the Force isn’t just in me, it’s in all of you too.”

The chamber bursts into an uproar as soon as the last word is out, but there’s a buzzing in Rey’s ears and she can’t hear anything distinct. Her hands are clenched into fists and her heartbeat races. This will not be her destiny. She won’t spend the rest of her life as their representative authority–and if these are the last words they will listen to, she doesn’t regret the ones she’s just chosen.

Leia touches Rey’s forearm, gently pulling her to sit on the bench. Her eyes are bright, her lips taut, and she squeezes her hand once they’re both seated.

“I can’t be you,” Rey mumbles, hoping it’s a good enough explanation. “I don’t want that destiny.”

“Good,” Leia says, with a ferocity that Rey has rarely heard from her. “Be better than us.”

_ I’m trying, _ Rey thinks.  _ We’re both trying. _

\---

Rey expects a dozen Force ghosts to appear after she so publicly and firmly rejects her “destiny”. But no one comes to rebuke her, living or ghost. The New Republic is in a frenzy over her decision, but Rey has never felt so free.

The last night she spends on Coruscant, she spends in Leia’s apartments. They eat a simple dinner of spiced fish and grain salad, and enjoy the quiet and the low, warm lighting. Ben is there for a while through the forcebond, and Rey thinks that maybe Leia can feel his presence even if she can’t see him. “I'm proud of you,” Leia says out of the blue at the end of the meal.

“I wasn’t looking for validation,” Rey replies. She feels Ben standing behind her, and feels the ghostly brush of his fingertips through her hair. A private intimacy, but not an interruption. 

“I know.” Leia smiles wryly. “But I’m not just saying it for your benefit. It’s true. Destiny robbed my family of a proper life, in more than just one generation. I didn’t realize how great the cost was until it was too late. I don’t know if any of us can truly escape destiny, but I’m glad that you’re trying. And…I’m hoping you’ll pass that along.”

Ben's hand clasps Rey’s shoulder and squeezes. Rey smiles. “I will.”

And just like that, they are both free. Or so it feels. If that’s naive, well, she'll find out soon enough. In the meantime, she ignores destiny and does what feels right. 

Maybe it’s all coincidence, but Rey thinks the Force approves, for her bond with Ben increases in both frequency and intensity over the next weeks. 

Before, it had always started with a little hush, a sort of warning. Now, it flickers in and out more naturally, at any and every moment. One moment she’s demonstrating Force meditation surrounded only by half a dozen children on Arkanis who had more-than-average Force sensitivity. The next moment, when her eyes open, Ben is sitting across from her, cross-legged and with the hint of a smile. She grins and he winks.

She’s on the Falcon a couple days later, shoving an entire stuffed grape leaf in her mouth with chopsticks, when he suddenly sits across from her. The look of horror on his face makes her chew indignantly. “Dyad,” she said warningly, once her mouth is clear. “Everything I do, it's like you're doing it too.” He opens his mouth, shuts it, and huffs out through his nose. Rey puts another grape leaf in her mouth and smiles around it. She reaches out across the table, palm upward, and he takes her hand without comment.

More often, too, he appears when she’s in the captain’s chamber. Sometimes this is obvious, as she’s asleep or just about to sleep. Wherever he is, he finds a way to lie down so that he can hold her. Or she holds him. Rey never asks, just moves on instinct.

Sometimes it’s just easier to talk, when he appears and she’s in a private space. Wherever he is, he never seems to have an audience that would question his talking to nothing. (Maybe that’s why he always turns his entire attention on her. Maybe he’s the more lonely one, still. The way he reaches for her every time, it’s like he’s been thinking of nothing else since the last bond ended.)

The bond lasts longer these days, and Rey starts conversations that she desperately wants the time to finish. Conversations that start with, “What happened after you left Luke” or “What did you mean, when you said ‘I feel it too’ so long ago” or “Do you ever resent that we’re bound together by fate?” Ben always looks her in the eyes and speaks slowly, carefully, though the truth clearly pains him at times. He shares his life and she shares hers in return, day after day and night after night.

It hurts as much as it heals. Sometimes once the words are spoken–words that had never been spoken aloud before–there are only silent tears, a soft embrace, and a laying of things to rest, perhaps for good. It feels right to move on from some stories. 

Rey had kissed him once, when death had been averted. If death was at stake, then she hadn’t wanted to leave any regrets. Some nights she dreams it over again, each detail enhanced–the feel of his chapped lips, the brush of his tongue against hers, the taste of his mouth, the warm moan in his throat, the feel of his hands tugging her closer, the press of his broad fingertips on her back. When she wakes, she aches for more than just dreams. 

Yet she holds back. So does Ben. For so long now it has felt like tempting disaster, to risk igniting something that the bond might end prematurely. Once, Ben kissed the back of her hand as they were falling asleep, and Rey had to swallow a groan–and then he was gone and she was alone, having to take matters into her own hands before she could fall asleep. She doesn’t want  _ that _ to happen at a more intimate moment.

But as time goes on, she questions both their judgments on the matter. “How long?” she asks, impatient, as the fifth month passes and the galaxy recovers and yet he still does atonement work on some distant planet.

“I won't put you in danger,” Ben insists. “I can’t meet you until I know it isn’t a trap for you. Not everyone trusts that you’ve denied the Jedi for pure reasons, and that’s my fault.” 

His hair has grown longer and he keeps it tied back now. The dark circles under his eyes have gone, and so have several shades of paleness from his skin. But with that improvement has come a gentleness, a concern, that sometimes Rey despises.

“I’m tired of doing things the right way,” she admits.

Ben gives her a wistful smile. “I’m not. Not yet.”

Unlike her bondmate, Rey would have settled for so much less than perfection. She would have settled for a disaster if it had been beautiful enough. Yet when she touches his hand and looks into his eyes, the visions of the future are so intense that she forgets how to breathe. She doesn’t always see details–sometimes just feelings that go all the way to her bones. But the promise is there, and it says,  _ you will be rewarded beyond imagining _ .

Maybe there are some things she is willing to wait on. They’ve stumbled their way to this point and now, free of all obligations and limitations, if Ben wants to do it “right” down to every last detail…well, Rey will let him.

But only so far. So far, and no farther. Rey knows where she will draw the line, and every day they come closer and closer to it.

Gone are the days of hesitation, at least. With every truth told, the distance between them seems less and less, despite the many parsecs of cold space. Rey twines her fingers with his, wraps him up in her arms while they sleep, brushes his hair smooth with her fingertips, and traces the lines of his face while staring into his eyes. She’s never had someone before–not like this, not in a way where she could think to herself,  _ this is mine.  _ And in return, he seems to devour her with eyes and hands and everything except what she desperately wants. He is affectionate–and yet controlled.

“Do you really want me?” she asks one night, exhausted and putting words to a stray fear that maybe she’s misjudged things.

The answering sound in his chest sends a rush of heat to her core. “Rey…”

“I'm serious,” she says, half a mumble, not meeting his eyes. But she can feel his answer. Fine. He does want her. She lays a palm on his chest and wishes he’d take off his shirt again. “We could do so much…”

There is a moment of silence and then, “I've never–” he says, raising his hand to cover hers. “Not fully.” He lets out a soft breath. “I don’t have many good memories, and I’d like  _ that _ to be one, when it happens. Better than good. I know where I want us to be, and it’s not like this. For one, anyone could walk in.”

She lets out a soft noise of understanding. But her thoughts linger, even as his touch does.

Perhaps it will always be something like this. Rey has never been in a relationship before. She never considered what it might be like, to share a lifetime with someone. To be one, and to navigate that unity through all areas of life. Maybe he will always be the one who finds meaning in the little things, in the planning, in the dedication. Maybe she will always feel the impulse to run headlong into the unknown, dragging him along with her. 

“I love you,” she says now, pressing her body in close.

His hand curls tighter around hers and he pulls her all the way in, wrapping her arm around his waist and then resting his hand at the small of her back. “I love you too.”

She can’t remember the first time he’d said it; it doesn’t matter, because each time feels just like the first, like he’s just gifted her both heart and soul. 

Rey tips her chin up to look him in the eyes, and finds that she has the words for her frustration after all. “We’re going to compromise on this, okay?”

Ben frowns. “On…?”

“Sex,” Rey says bluntly.

If part of her expected him to argue, the rest of her is relieved when he doesn’t. “I didn't mean it to be a conflict in need of negotiation,” he says, his cheeks coloring. “If it seemed like–”

Rey puts a finger to his lips. “Shh. No. I know it matters to you. And that’s fine, Ben, but we won and I’m frustrated with not getting my full victory. If I can’t have all of you yet, because it’s not the right moment…then I’m going to imagine what the right moment feels like, and you’re going to help.”

He’s never looked more bewildered, and somehow that makes the need stronger than it’s ever been. It takes all her effort to not kiss that bewilderment away until his lips are swollen.

Rey keeps her gaze on him and rolls to the side, until their bodies are no longer tightly pressed together. The bond is still active–so she’ll take advantage of that. 

It’s pointless to explain verbally what is happening next. No one has ever made masturbation sound appealing in words, at least in Rey’s experience. So she keeps her gaze locked on his and trails her hand over her breasts, down her belly, and over the waistband of her sleeping shorts.

He might never have slept with someone else, but Ben is no fool. The confusion in his eyes turns into a cocktail of hunger and curiosity, and she sees the breath catch in his throat, the bob of his adam’s apple as he swallows.

Under normal circumstances, she’d go to her usual routine and get it done quickly. Back in her Jakku days, it had made the loneliness worse if she tried to fantasize something better. It was easier to focus on the physical and move on. But this is something to share. A hint at the intimacy still to come. She trusts that the forcebond will last, and for the first time doesn’t feel impatient.

“Can I?” Ben asks breathlessly, tugging at her waistband.

She nods, and he removes the shorts fast. He’s got the idea now.

Rey lies back against the pillow and parts her thighs, feeling the cool air against her already-overheated flesh. Ben’s on his side, wherever he is, watching. Not touching, even now that she’s stripped. She likes that more than she thought she might.

Her fingers trace gently over her mound, between the tufts of brown hair. She’s never been this gentle with herself before. She already feels full to bursting, and yet her fingers are still hesitant.

Ben’s eyes are like pools of caf, dotted with embers. There’s greed in those eyes, and they keep darting from her face to between her legs and then back again.

Rey tries to focus on her breathing as she arches her hips a little, spreading her folds with two fingers. She bites down on her lip and sighs. Weeks of frustration and only hasty orgasms have her wet now without any previous touch, and her fingertips quickly become slick as she caresses slowly along the sides of her clit.

His gaze intensifies, as if he’s trying to memorize her every move. She keeps her thighs parted so he can see all of her, all of this act–she wants him to know what’s waiting, once they finally have their perfect moment to do more.

Slowly, almost quivering with the sensation, Rey brushes the pad of her forefinger in small circles, breaking the rhythm only to stroke down and then back up with the entire length of her fingers. Her core is demanding attention and she gives it nothing. Not yet. But she can’t help but imagine what Ben might do if he wasn't so controlled. If he brought one of his hands between her legs. His fingers are long and thick, and she clenches around nothing at the thought of how good they’d feel inside her right now. 

His breathing is thick and hot. The captain’s chamber on the Falcon is enclosed, keeping them close. She can smell her arousal and almost hear the thudding of his heartbeat. When her eyes flit down to his trousers, there’s no doubt that he desires her.

Maybe this isn’t  _ exactly _ what she wants right now, but it’s good, so good. Rey holds Ben’s gaze and rocks her hips up and down, alternating between circles with her fingertips and firm pressure with the heel of her hand right over her clit. She can feel her skin flushing, her nipples tightening, and every inch of her body is on fire. This, more than any hurried self-pleasuring, feels close to satisfying what she really wants.

“Rey,” Ben whispers, barely audible. It’s so soft, she wonders if he knows he said it out loud.

Rey lets out a heavy breath, quickening her pace, and her eyes close halfway as she pictures what it’ll be like when he is not just watching with hands clenched at his side.

He doesn’t touch himself or give in to impulse. Somehow that thought makes Rey whimper, the movement of her hips more erratic as she gets closer and closer.

The forcebond lasts just long enough for the rush of orgasm to flood her body, for her to cry out softly, to feel like she’s composed of only hot, melting pleasure for a blissfully long moment. She breathes deeply, unable to keep a smile from her face.

Ben breaks, just a little, and leans in to kiss her. It’s not as hard as she wants, but it surprises her and she kisses eagerly back.

Before she can say that she loves him, that she can’t wait for more of this, the forcebond ends and she’s left with only her afterglow. This is the compromise they’re making, for now.

Rey tugs on her sleeping shorts and finds herself still smiling, despite it all. She holds back for him, he holds back for her. Or maybe he doesn’t–maybe he’s working out the frustration she just gave him into his own hand. Either way, she’s got a little of what she wants. All she had to do was ask.

This isn’t destiny. This isn’t because of the Force connecting them across the stars. This is two people finding their way to each other, step by step, and there’s nothing mystical about it.

Rey sleeps and dreams of happiness. It’s so close she can taste it, and she can make it happen. Nothing is going to stop her.

\---

The New Republic finally issues a withdrawal of their warrant against “Kylo Ren”. No explanation provided. A good portion of the galaxy calls them cowards and is incensed, but the decision stands. 

Ben hasn’t heard, when they next connect, and Rey hesitates to tell him in case the backlash makes the Senate reverse the decree. She’s picked up a little of Ben’s caution, it seems. But she dares to hope that maybe the end of their separation is nigh.

It reminds her to finally have a conversation with Leia about the status of her relationship with Ben. To her shock, the woman bursts out laughing. 

“What is it?” Rey demands, having expected concern instead of laughter. 

“You're both such idiots,” Leia says through her chuckles. “And I thought Han and I were bad.”

Rey felt insulted on both their behalfs, and skulked off with a frown after Leia embraced her and kissed her forehead. Of course, once she laid out the evidence in an attempt to use her brain instead of her gut, it didn’t look…well, it didn’t look like they  _ weren’t _ idiots.

Maybe they’d spent too many years holding their cards close to the chest, because it didn’t have to turn out this way.

She can barely imagine a universe where she told Ben straight out that she wanted him–wanted  _ Ben _ –instead of shipping herself to the Finalizer. A universe where they had used words instead of sabers and assumptions. Where they didn't spend half their forcebonds just staring, too unsure to do much else. 

But she also tries to imagine a universe where she didn't have to work so hard at it. If she had been loved from the start, and had grown up with family and friends. Ben too, so that they'd met each other on equal terms. It's a lot harder–she can't truly envision a world where they didn't first find solace in each other's brokenness. Though she hopes that if it exists, it's a nice world.

The good thing about rejecting destiny, she decides, is that you don't need to worry about being perfect. You can try to do the right thing, and maybe make mistakes along the way, but you don’t need to obsess on them. Even Ben, who has made deeper mistakes than anyone Rey knows, cannot fix the past or the present or the future by loathing his own transgressions. 

Leia had laughed, but she is happy for them. Because they’ve made something good–even if it hasn't come easily. Rey feels like she's stumbled and pined every step of the way, ever since she met Ben. 

It’s a little ironic that she’s on Jakku when the important day finally comes. She’d grimaced as soon as she landed on the cursed planet, determined to merely check up on the aid they’d sent to all the homeless scavengers. No one had recognized her, even people who had once been her fierce rivals for machine parts.

A shiver runs up her spine when she finds her AT-AT relatively untouched. She pulls back the curtain and enters, breathing in the dry scent of death that brings back too many memories. The interior has been stripped, but time has left the rest of it undisturbed. Even her tally marks on the wall.

Rey had poured out the story of this part of her life to Ben without hesitation. But it had hurt–it still hurts–to remember how cruelly she’d denied herself any feelings of pain. She’d been so afraid of letting anyone see her wounded and vulnerable. Even herself. Now, touching the tally marks, she feels the pain tugging from her stomach to the back of her spine. Threatening to draw her back to the lost child she’d been.

She’d been waiting for a family to return, back then, but what she’d really been waiting for was for anyone to take notice and care. If not the people who gave birth to her, then who? She’d found it hard to believe when Maz had told her,  _ “The belonging you seek is not behind you, it is ahead.” _

Not so long ago, she’d had many a resentful thought about waiting for her happy ending. Now, remembering her childhood, she realizes that it’s different. She’s not waiting for love–she  _ has _ that. She’s not waiting to belong–she  _ found  _ her place and her purpose, and people respect that and accept her. 

Her happy ending isn’t just a fantasy anymore, and she’s not desperate. The happiness she waits for now is full and real and only just around the corner. It’s just like waiting for the sun to rise again. It’s inevitable.

As if on cue, the forcebond ignites, and Ben’s face is bright. Before she can smile, he says, “I think we're safe.”

The four words hit her so hard, filling her with such joy, that Rey almost bursts into tears.

Her face reveals the intensity of the emotion, if not the cause, and Ben’s brow furrows and he walks forward to cradle her face in his hands. “What's wrong?”

Rey tries to smile, but she can feel her lips quiver with a stronger emotion. “Nothing,” she says. “Finally…nothing.”

His sigh of relief is shaky, and his eyes scan her face to make sure of the sincerity of her words. Then, with a smile that she never gets tired of, he leans down and kisses her.

Rey opens her mouth to it, ready to devour him–and every wound she’s ever taken to her heart feels wiped away with love and desire and hope. She twines her arms around his neck and pulls herself up on her toes, kissing back hard enough that her teeth knock against his. She doesn’t care. His fingers tangle in her hair and he kisses her deeper, with a groan that sends heat all the way down to her toes.

When she pulls back from the kiss, he looks stunned, and she doesn’t understand it until he looks around. “Is this…Jakku?”

Rey blinks. “I… You can see it?”

“You pulled me through the bond,” he says, in that tone that says that he’s distracted by intellectual fascination again, trying to make sense of facts. “I’m on Jakku.”

“Ben,” she says pointedly, until he looks back to her and stops his analysis of the situation. She can feel her lip twitch with a little irritation–how can a trait of his both endear and annoy her? 

“Well,” he says, shrugging, his hands moving as if he doesn’t know what to do with them. “Like I said, I think we’re safe. So we can…do anything.” His eyes meet hers and he waits for a response.

It's the most awkward he’s ever been, but it doesn’t matter. How can people find words for this? He’s standing in front of her, in the heart of her old life. Here is where she grieved her worst griefs, suffered her loneliest nights, and stared up at the sky with a belly gnawing for hunger–and a heart just as hungry. But here he is and she thinks, maybe Jakku isn’t so bad after all?

He's waiting for a reply, and her thoughts are a blur, but finally she smiles and says the only thing that comes to mind. “I’ve waited my whole life for you. I want to do everything now. Everything. Everywhere. With you.”

Ben laughs and steps in to kiss her again, lifting her off her feet with both hands. “I love you,” he says, kissing her mouth and her nose and both cheekbones. “I love you, I love you, I love you.”

Rey devours his love with a hundred kisses and gives it back to him, double strong, with a heart that no longer aches. 

Through breathless kisses and groping hands, they make it to Rey’s old bed, but barely. Ben takes a page from Rey’s book of impulsiveness and changes his mind about his grand plan of a romantic trip to Naboo, and the wide soft bed with a view of the lakes where he planned to make love for the first time. Or rather, he postpones it. 

Wherever they are, he seems to decide, that is special enough. They fumble their way to pleasure a dozen times, then sleep entwined, and then repeat the cycle until Rey can’t even remember what planet they’re on.

The forcebond ends there, though Rey doesn’t know it at the time. The fact that they’re a dyad is never relevant again. Because this isn’t destiny. This happy ending is one that they made from scratch, with hand and heart and hope. And they will keep making it even better and happier, day by day, for the rest of their lives.


End file.
